


she acts like summer and walks like rain

by poiregourmande



Category: Buzzfeed As/Is, Buzzfeed Ladylike (Web Series)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-25
Updated: 2019-02-25
Packaged: 2019-11-05 13:30:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17919722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poiregourmande/pseuds/poiregourmande
Summary: When Jen feels lonely at night, she flips through the pages, finds her favourites – that purple dog with seven eyes, or that witchy girl in the blue flower – and imagines adventures with them.Sometimes her train of thought brings her to fall asleep dreaming of warm brown curls and tiny soft hands, but we don’t talk about that.





	she acts like summer and walks like rain

Jen Ruggirello has always liked collecting stuff. Knifes, stickers, or, when she was a kid, these little fun-shaped erasers that smelled great but didn’t actually work. Her most prized possession, nowadays, is a scrapbook.

Or rather, the contents of the scrapbook. Jen is the proud owner of 103 Sara Rubin originals. The thing is, Sara isn’t actually aware Jen has this. It’s not like Jen stole them or whatever. More like _rescued_.

See, Sara always has a pencil in hand, is always drawing, sketching or doodling. So wherever she goes – meeting rooms, canteen, shoots – she leaves a trail of pieces of scrap paper, covered in tiny masterpieces. They would end up in the recycling bin if Jen didn’t carefully pick them up, save them in a scrapbook, and give them names and backstories.

When Jen feels lonely at night, she flips through the pages, finds her favourites – that purple dog with seven eyes, or that witchy girl in the blue flower – and imagines adventures with them.

Sometimes her train of thought brings her to fall asleep dreaming of warm brown curls and tiny soft hands, but we don’t talk about that. 

***

Sara groans. This video has taken so long to export she’s had time to draw three pieces – and not just tiny doodles, but full on sketches. She looks them over, adding touches of color here and there with a stray purple marker, when she realizes something about them looks familiar.

Sara doesn’t draw real people – it’s not what her art is about. But when she looks at these three drawings – three different shots of the same alien cat girl – she can’t help but feel like they remind her of something. Sort of an itch you keep scratching but can’t quite get right, like it’s set deeper than you can reach.

Maybe it’s the smile? Charming, mischievous, with a hint of self deprecation?

Or the way she holds herself? Going from tight like a coiled spring to laid back and open, but always a bit awkward.

Someone taps on her shoulder and she jumps.

“Oh sorry about that,” Jen says, taking a step back. “Didn’t mean to –“

– but Sara doesn’t hear what she’s saying, because Jen is wearing a purple t-shirt and cat ears. She does a double take from Jen to her drawings, flips the pages as discretely as possible so Jen doesn’t notice.

Jen only sees her noticing the ears. “Oh this?” she chuckles, poking them. “It’s for a video. A bit silly, but it’s cute.” She shrugs.

Sara tries as hard as she can to listen to Jen, but ultimately only gets that Jen needs her for something. She follows her, trying to get her inner turmoil under control.

So she drew Jen.   
_Three times in a row_ , her brain helpfully supplies.   
This doesn’t mean a thing.   
_You were daydreaming about going on space adventures with cat girl, of course it means something_.

Why is her inner monologue always right? And gay?

_Jen’s pretty cute today._

Sara chokes on her own spit at that, trying to look everywhere but at Jen, which is pretty hard since Jen is patting her back and trying to make eye contact to see if she’s okay. “Careful, lil lady,” she says. “We need you alive and breathing for the shoot. Y’okay?”

Sara gapes at her. “I – can I get some water?”

“You got it!” Jen shoots her some finger guns before bouncing away, and Sara can finally catch her breath.

But Jen comes back and winks at her, and rubs circles on her back while she drinks, and Sara’s brain goes _wheeeeeeee!_ again.

“So what’s the video?” Sara asks, clearing her throat.

“ _Artists Try to Draw With Someone Else’s Hand_. I’m holding the pencil and you’re drawing with my hand.”

“Oh.”

“Is this okay?”

Sara’s gonna have to hold Jen’s hand for like half an hour _on camera_ while trying to corral a crush she wasn’t even aware of twenty minutes ago?

“Of course.”

***

“So how’s this supposed to work?” Sara’s standing next to Jen’s chair, wondering where to put herself. “You’re a leftie, right?”

Jen passes a pencil from one hand to the other. “I mean I can hold it in my right hand since you’re the one drawing. God, that’s weird,” she says, making doodling motions in the air with her right hand.

“Okay, so…” Sara pulls up a chair right next to Jen, but she has to lean in a weird way to be able to hold her wrist, and even then she doesn’t see the paper.

“Um, how’s this?” Jen pushes her chair back and sits on Sara’s lap, holding her hand ready for Sara to take it.

“Oh, um, sure.” Sara takes Jen’s hand and starts drawing.

After a bit, Sara forgets she’s on camera, forgets she’s got a cute girl in her lap, she’s just letting the drawing guide her.

It’s not pretty or good by any means, it’s pretty hard to draw with someone’s hand, but Sara loves it nonetheless. It’s her alien cat girl and her blue flower witch, holding hands as they stroll across Saturn’s rings.

“Whoa,” Jen says, holding the drawing up to the camera, “this is amazing! Did you have fun?” she asks Sara.

Jen is still sitting in her lap for the wrap up of the video, and Sara realizes that while she was focused on drawing, her left hand came to rest on Jen’s hip. Jen doesn’t seem to mind.

“Yeah, I did,” she says, beaming.

“So did I. Can I keep this?” Jen asks, gingerly holding the sheet like it was a priceless masterpiece.

Sara nods. Out of the corner of her eye, Mike turns the camera off and slinks out of the room. Jen grins and hooks her arms around her neck.

“Can I tell you a secret?”

“Is it the fact that you orchestrated this whole thing to sit on my lap?” Sara asks, grinning.

“No, that’s just an unexpected perk. The secret is that I’m gonna add this to my collection of Sara art.”

“You have a collection?” Sara’s eyes widen.

“A scrapbook. All the small doodles you leave behind. I give them a home.”

“Jen, that’s…”

“Creepy?”

“Lovely.”

Just as lovely as the softness of Jen’s lips on Sara’s, of her hands on Sara’s neck.


End file.
